


set fire to the third bar

by Wallyallens



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Drinking, Implied Relationships, M/M, RipFic, two emotionally repressed englishmen walk into a bar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-28
Updated: 2018-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-25 00:14:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13822434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wallyallens/pseuds/Wallyallens
Summary: Three times John & Rip met in bars. Alternatively, two trench-coated Englishmen walk into a bar, and the punchline is their lives.





	set fire to the third bar

John left the ship and was instantly glad for the faint warmth of the cigarette between his lips – central city in early February got _cold_. Between the wind-chill from the water pulling at his coat as he shoved his hands deep into his pockets, and the wave of air a moment later as the Waverider took off, John pulled up the collar of his coat against the temperature and swore under his breath. With a glance over his shoulder to check that the legends were gone, he rubbed his hands together and tutted a spell to remove any chance of his being tracked, taking off towards the city when he was sure that he was alone.

He could have done another spell to locate his next target, but John had a hunch he wouldn’t need one.

Instead, he put his head down and walked until he was far away from the bright lights and streets lined with the red blurs characteristic of the city; it was only when the streetlights were dimmer, and the streets a little more crooked with leaves piled in the gutter, that he knew he was getting close. The Flash didn’t run here. Finding what seemed to be the seediest bar on a street of seedy bars, John ducked his head through the open door and stepped into a crowd of smoke and people who might have stepped straight out of Black Gate Penitentiary – a few looked over as he entered, but John simply put his cigarette out on the door and headed for the bar.

There was a familiar figure hunched over a whiskey tumbler towards the end of the bar. The glass was half-empty and his eyes were half-gone and he had been half-empty for as long as John had known him, but he looked particularly bad this time – unshaven, skinnier than ever, with the distinct air of someone who had not slept a full night in weeks. But his eyes were still on the mirror above the bar, watching the door, and even amid the bar on the brink of breaking into a fight just for the sake of it, nobody bothered him.

John sat down beside him. “Buy a bloke a drink, an’ he might just make your night.”

Rip Hunter snorted into his glass, sparing John a look out of the corner of his eyes. “John. You’re late.”

“I came in _your_ time machine,” John answered, waving the bartender over, “-how can I be late?”

“Not mine-” Rip replied, quietly. “Not anymore.”

John cocked his head to one side. So they were having one of _those_ nights. Luckily, his drink came and he was able to swallow it down in three gulps and order a second in between Rip’s deep sigh. It wasn’t the first time he’d been with Rip on a bad night – they’d shared their fair few – but neither of them were good at talking honestly while sober, so he had some catching up to do. Downing a second glass, John turned to the other man.

“So. Your tip about the asylum and the girl turned out to be a good one.”

Rip’s lip tugged up wryly as he lifted his glass, tapping his temple hazily: “I do actually know what I’m doing, contrary to popular belief.”

“Funny thing about it, though – turned out the girl was Nora sodding Darhk.”

Rip feigned ignorance. “You don’t say-”

“You knew it would lead me to them.”

It’s not a question. It came out too harshly for that. John turned in his chair to face Rip as he said it; leaving the other man with nowhere to hide except the bottom of his glass. Rip drained it before he lifted his eyes to meet John’s.

“How are they?”

He didn’t even bother denying the manipulation, the bastard. Rip had fed him a tip about a possession _knowing_ it would lead John to the legends – to Mallus – and the sad thing is, John would have gone anyway, had Rip just asked. But _no_ – that would seem too much like Rip _needed_ him, and Rip _bloody_ Hunter couldn’t have that. God Forbid he asked for help, or relied on anyone but his own bloody self-

“Are you quite done?” Rip asked, drolly, and John realised he’d said all of that out loud.

“ _No_ -” John griped into his glass, “-yes. Maybe. What’s the bloody point, anyway? You don’t care.”

“That’s not true.”

Rip said it so earnestly, it pissed him off. His eyes cleared as he looked over at John, leaning closer between their bar stools, and John believed him. But Rip didn’t get to sit there looking so open after lying, so John flipped him off and took a sip instead of answering, to which the other man pinched the bridge of his nose and continued –

“I sent you that tip because I thought that you could help. You were the _only_ one who could. There was a chance – however small – that Mallus could be prevented from possessing Nora Darhk, and I knew that you were the best hope for that end-”

“The flattery is nice, love, but that’s not the point here,” John replied icily. “I would’ve helped if you’d asked. But it would have been nice for a head’s up, first – a call, a text, anything – ‘ _oh hey John, by the way, there’s an ancient demon terrorising the timeline, if you could be a daft enough sod to get involved and try to kill it, that’d be grand’_.”

“That’s not – I didn’t think you could kill Mallus-”

“ _Oh_ , so you don’t even think I’m a good enough exorcist now, well-”

“ – whatever it is, it’s too old for it to be that simple.” Rip went on like John hadn’t interrupted, “But I thought that if you could stop it from possessing Nora Darhk while it was still weak, then it would change the timeline. I – I don’t expect you to _stop_ Mallus, John – I don’t know if it’s even possible - I just thought you could help her.”

“You? _You_ wanted to change the timeline?” John blinked in surprise. “Why?”

“I thought that if I could change one thing, I could . . . limit the potential danger of Mallus.”

For a moment, John watched Rip carefully. The other man was looking pointedly ahead, avoiding John’s gaze – but he saw right through him. Once he had realised that Rip was a man who appeared cold only outwardly, but would give his life for the person beside him, John had been able to read Rip easily, like a well-thumbed tome. And _yes_ , there was an innuendo hidden in there somewhere.

“You thought that by changing the past, you could change the future. That you could save them from Mallus.”

“Among other things-” Rip admitted, eyes down. “Without the power of Mallus, Nora Darhk would never have been able to restore her father to life. And if it hadn’t have been for that mission-”

“It wouldn’t have known Sara’s name.”

Rip didn’t deny the connection; a muscle in his jaw twitched at the name. He always did wear his heart on his sleeve in that way.

“You have a bloody stupid way of showing them you care, Rip.”

Head bobbing, sarcasm evident, Rip rolled his eyes. “So I’ve been told.”

Snorting into his drink, by now the world except for the glass and Rip fading away, John let a tinge of bitterness creep into his tone. “I might have been able to stop Mallus, if I’d have known what the bloody hell was going on. Not telling me put me in danger, Rip – it put _them_ in danger.”

At the mention of the legends, Rip sobered. His face fell slack, and guilt pricked so visibly in his eyes that it was pitiful – John couldn’t believe that the legends thought that Rip didn’t care for them. He loved them. Anyone with eyes who knew him could see it.

“That’s not what I wanted.”

“It never is!” Tired of being angry, John sighed into his glass. “You’re an idiot, you know that? You have – you _had_ – people who cared about you.”

“Don’t-”

It sounded like a plea, but John kept going.

“No, I mean it. When we first met, you were different. Lost. And . . . and I was right there with you.”

It wasn’t an understatement. John had first met Rip just over five years ago, by his timeline. He’d been in America for six months and still dreamt of Newcastle nightly. He was staying in New York – a good city for wanderers and lost souls. The streets echoed endlessly and there was enough work to keep him busy, fighting whatever darkness he could find at night and drinking himself to sleep by morning. At the rate he’d been going, he would have been dead before the year was out.

That night in particular he had ended up in a bar somewhere in Star City – Star _ling_ , back then. It was a dive complete with a glowing red neon sign with half the letters burned out and alcohol that appeared to have been brewed out the back in an old petrol tank. It was just the sort of place he’d felt at home, back then. It was full enough that he could go unnoticed, with voices filling the space so he didn’t have to; the world was unable to penetrate the muddy dullness he carried around with him, floating aimlessly through without ever making contact. He was barely there, and halfway gone.

Rip had been a stranger at the bar with eyes as tired as his own. He’d been slumped against the counter in the dark when John had all but fell into the seat beside him.

“Mind if I join you?”

John was sure he’d slurred the words, ciggy hanging half out of his lips, and received a cold shoulder and gruff reply.

“Yes.”

“Good,” John replied. “You know what they say about misery and company.”

The stranger had turned to look at him then, and John’s cigarette had fallen from his parted lips. John knew he wasn’t one to judge – he was wearing an old _Mucus Membrane_ t-shirt he hadn’t washed in days under his coat, and still had more piercings than common sense, not to mention this was a point in his life where he used to cut his own hair – but the man looked _rough_.

Eyes peered out from dark circled lids, and the shabby brown coat he wore was splashed with drink he had spilled onto himself; there was a beard forming patchily on his face, unkempt as the brown hair nested atop his head. But even then – there was something bright and dangerous in those green eyes of his.

“You look like hell, mate.” John tilted his head, challengingly holding his gaze. “And I’d know.”

The man squinted at him. “Who _are_ you?”

John plastered on his best smile – it strained at the seams and hadn’t been real in months now, but it wasn’t as hard as it had been some nights. Blandly, he groped in his pocket for a card and handed it over.

“John Constantine. Exorcist, drunk, yadda yadda yadda . . .”

As his eyes scanned over the card, the man’s brows set into a sarcastic line. “ _Master of the dark arts_?”

John rolled his eyes, “Yeah, I know. Makes me sound like a prick. I’m gettin’ new ones.”

After a snort that could have been a laugh but failed, the stranger slumped back onto his stool, listlessly raising his drink before draining it. It seemed he had decided to stay, although he made no other effort to make conversation – but his eyes sidled back to John after a minute or two silent drinking, curiously. After waiting a whole five minutes for the man to ask whatever it was he wanted to ask, John turned to him.

“So. What’re you doing here?”

The man raised a glass, shaking it snappily: “ _drinking_.”

“Ah,” John leaned forward, eyebrows raised seductively, “-but what are you drinking to forget?”

The man squinted at him again, draining his glass instead of answering. With his collar popped up, John had to lean against the bar to get a look at his face – but the clouded eyes skirting away said it all. John’s smirk deepened, until the man shrugged and replied.

“I’m drinking to forget how big the future is.”

“A small job, then-” John chuckled. “Christ, mate – you are a barrel of laughs. What you got against the future?”

“What it has against _me_ would be more accurate-” the man replied, turning now. “But I answered, so it’s your turn. What are you trying to run from, Mr. Constantine?”

“Ah, nothing as exciting as time itself-” John flourished a hand, “Jus’ my demons, is all.”

The stranger snorted, and held up his glass briefly. John clashed his own against it.

They both drank to that. A more comfortable silence settled between them, as both men drank too much and tried to think less. After a while catching the stranger shoot him looks in the mirror above the bar, John sighed and said aloud.

“Ask whatever it is you’re thinking.”

“How do you know I have a question?”

John smiled, cat-like. “Magic.”

“Is it real?” the man asked, too quickly to be accidental. There was a strange desperation in his tone, and he nervously passed John’s card between his hands. “Ghosts. The afterlife. Can you – can you contact the dead?”

And there it was. John deflated a little, puffed up chest sagging, and shook his head. “Sorry. Would that I could, mate, but some things – well, perhaps we’re better off, yeah? I’ve got my ghosts too, but I’m not sure I’d like what they had to say to me.”

Although the man nodded understandingly, there was regret to the twist of his lip as he did so.

“Maybe you’re right.”

He looked so sad that John leaned closer, in a rare moment of optimism – he couldn’t leave the poor guy like that. So he pulled a pack of cards from his pocket and began spreading them across the bar, shuffling them deftly as the man’s expression dissolved from a reckless despair to something akin to amusement. Once the cards were settled, John glanced up at the man beside him.

“That doesn’t mean there isn’t magic, though. Pick a card.”

The man’s eyebrow jumped up, “You’re kidding me.”

“Just do it, alright?”

Sighing, the man obeyed, sliding a card from a third of the way into the pack and hiding its face from John. He looked at the card before his eyes darted up to John, who made a face like a two-bit fortune teller, pressing his fingers to his temple and squinting. Another shard of ice melted in the strangers eyes. They were nice eyes, John noticed.

“Your card is . . . ah!” John smirked like he’d just been struck by some great revelation. “My favourite card – the King of Hearts.”

The man managed to hold his gaze for ten whole seconds before the edge of his lip twitched up – it wasn’t quite a laugh, just half of a smile – but it was something.

“Nice try. You get points for the patter, but unfortunately-” the man flicked the card around in his hands to reveal a black house, “-the three of Spades.”

“Are you sure?” John asked, faux-innocently. Leaning forward, he made to examine the card in the other man’s hand, letting his hand linger on a wrist hidden beneath a brown sleeves. “You should really take a second look at that.”

Giving an impressive roll of his eyes, the man turned the card to look again – as he did, John reached forward to flick the card – turning black houses to red, the three of Spades into the King of Hearts.

It was a simple trick: illusionary magic, cheap stuff, the kind of thing it was probably easier to do with sleight of hand – but it gained him a smile that was more real as it settled on the man’s face. It was still small, not quite parting his lips, but it reached those sad eyes and lifted the weight of the world from them for just a moment. John realised how close he had moved when the man looked up, and those green eyes were close enough to see the change in them.

“I never did catch your name,” John reminded him, making no movement away or closer. He just lingered, eyes darting from the stranger’s eyes to his lips.

“And what will you trade for it?”

The stranger didn’t move away, and John felt his smirk deepen. “I know another trick or two.”

“I’m Rip. Rip Hunter.”

The next morning, when John woke up in his shitty motel with the broken, buzzing radiator that was never quiet, he expected to be alone. He wasn’t sure at first if it was a good or bad surprise that the man was still there. When he did wake, Rip dressed quickly, pulling on his coat and stumbling over his words.

“I should, er- I should go.”

“You don’t have to,” John said, even as Rip had one foot out of the door. Hooking his hands behind his head, John threw one last line, calling out. “Time traveller!”

In the doorway, Rip froze. After a heartbeat, he slowly spun on his heel to face John, face carefully neutral. “What do you mean by that?”

“I’m a mage, and you’re not from around here. That much is obvious.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, really?” John pulled Rip’s gun from under the bed-sheets, spinning it idly on his thumb, “So I suppose you have no idea where this pretty little trinket came from, then?”

Rip’s face grew stony as a hand flew to his hip, eyes widening as he found his holster empty. “You _stole_ that!”

“How can I have stolen something that doesn’t exist?” John teased, looking down the barrel of the gun. “Because this isn’t an ordinary gun. And you’re not an ordinary man, Rip Hunter.”

After a moment, Rip sighed in resignation. “What do you want?”

“Nothing-” John shook his head, standing. Crossing over to Rip, gathering the sheets around him, he passed him the gun, holding his hands up in peace. “You’ve got it all wrong. You can take that right now if you want, leave . . .”

“Or?”

“Or you can call me. I have some work, and you look like you need a mission.”

Although Rip shook his head, the panic faded from his body – he relaxed, shoulders dropping as he stood in the doorway, anger slowly leaving the sharpness of his gaze. He rubbed a hand over his eyes, rolled on his heels, and looked back up at John.

“So do I-” he said, earnestly. “I have work, I mean. A mission – well, I’m starting one. I’m setting up a – time organisation, for lack of a better word. But I will-” Rip glanced up, before his eyes jumped down to his feet, “-call you. Maybe. If that’s okay.”

John felt a grin spread over his face.

“Any time, time traveller.”

It went like that, for a while. They drank too much and spent too many nights in shitty motels and picked too many fights with their demons. John went on cases. Rip talked vaguely about his plans for the future, when he called and they met up. Often in Central – but once on a shitty night, John called Rip from New York with a voice too shaky and Rip had been there in ten minutes. Afterwards, John would wonder how. At the time he was just grateful not to be alone in all his wretched misery.

Eventually, John had learned about Rip’s family. The shadow of his grief had encompassed Rip back then, like the moon in an eclipse – there was still light, but it was obscured by the weight of an indifferent universe. They held each other together in the dark.

In all of those long nights, John never asked Rip to save Astra. John had thought that it would overwhelm him: the prospect of being able to right his mistake and travel in time to try again, but he thought that asking would break Rip, so he held his silence.

Their messy half-existence and love was enough, for a while.

Until Rip told him one day of a plan to save his family, and the world. To recruit a team to travel back in time and kill Vandal Savage. To set back the clock. Rip told John about the Waverider and the team and how they had tried to change time itself.

A little over a year since meeting Rip Hunter, John had asked the unspeakable question.

“What about Astra?”

“What do you mean?”

“If you tried changing the timeline before, if you’ve crossed that line – we can save her too. We could _try_.”

Rip’s face froze, then. It was a shattered thing. “I-I’m sorry, John. You’re a part of that timeline, it’s – fixed. We can’t.”

“Bollocks-” John had said, standing. “Bollocks! If you can change the timeline for yourself, you can do it for her-”

“I can’t-”

“SHE’S JUST A KID!” John shouted. There had been whiskey in his blood and tears in his eyes, and Rip didn’t blink. “Rip . . . _please_.”

That had been the beginning of the end. The argument led to John storming out and spending the night in the gutter, and Rip leaving for his mission to recruit a bunch of wannabe spies and pencil pushers to save the world. Losing that strand, he threw himself into his work – he worked and he drank and he burnt himself out, right the way the asylum.

John hadn’t heard from Rip again until two years ago.

It had just been another night at another bar. Then Rip came in, just a figure in trench coat at first glance – until John caught his eyes. Rip had stopped in his tracks, eyes wide with shock, as they just stared at each other for a long moment. John had expected to be angry – he wanted to be angry, in his bones and his aching bleeding soul – but one look at Rip had softened his hate to understanding. Rip looked _tired_.

Rip sat next to him and spoke, before John could even form words: “I’d already tried. After we had met, I took the Waverider back to Newcastle, to the night she-” his voice had caught, and he hadn’t looked at John yet. “I tried to intervene in the events and save Astra. I failed and you died instead. I went back and tried _again_ , and you both died. I did the same thing, _over and over and over_ , and in every timeline – she died every time, John. The only thing that changed was if you died with her.”

John stared at him, feeling as if his beating heart had just been carved from his ribcage, hollowing him out.

“That might’ve been for the best,” he choked out, eventually. “Maybe I should’ve died with her. ‘Least she wouldn’t have been alone.”

“ _No_ -” Rip shook his head, firmly. “If there is one thing I’m sure of, it’s that the world is better with you in it. Think of all of the people you’ve saved since that night, John. There are souls on this earth that wouldn’t be, if it wasn’t for you.”

John had nothing to say to that, blinking heavily. Smoke billowed around his head as he exhaled, and he blamed it for the pricking behind his eyes. All the while, Rip sat beside him. A glass was placed in front of him, and John’s was refilled; as John lifted his mirthlessly, Rip echoed his action beside him. They didn’t make a toast, or click their glasses together – there was no celebration, just the burn of the alcohol and too much to say.

Eventually, Rip spoke. “I’m sorry, John. I tried to save her.”

“Why didn’t you just tell me?”

John hated how hoarse his voice sounded, and Rip winced. “I thought that by not telling you, that I could spare you the same pain I felt. I did the same thing with my family, tried to save them for what felt like lifetimes . . . I wouldn’t wish the feeling of that – that _failure_ – on anybody. Not least somebody I cared about.”

Rip’s gaze was intense, like sunlight flashing on an open sea; so close to him that John had to look away. John blinked in surprise at the word, swirling the amber-coloured liquid around in his glass. He took a quiet moment to think. Then he noticed now how much more life there was in Rip’s eyes than there had been all those years ago. Nodding sadly, John looked back up and offered forgiveness for the past.

“I wish one of us had been able to fix the past.”

Rip looked back, steadily: “As do I.”

They sat and drank until the bar closed, until it was just the two of them left on worn-down stools as the barkeep swept up around them. As they stood to leave, John turned to Rip.

“And now? What’s the future hold for Rip Hunter?”

He said it sarcastically, and Rip laughed gently, eyes on his feet; John hated that he had to look up at Rip, just a little.

“I still have the Bureau-”

“Oh, so it’s called the _Bureau_ now?” John laughed. “Very proper.”

“Someone needs to maintain the timeline from any that would harm it.”

John rolled his eyes “-still a time-master.”

“No,” Rip shook his head in disgust. He moved agitatedly at the suggestion, turning towards the door and muttering quietly, as if to himself, “-something different.”

John looked at him from the corner of his eyes as they exited the bar; then tossed a cigarette between his lips. The silver of his lighter caught in the streetlights, flashing, and he lit up a second later, sucking in smoke and breathing out a hazy halo.

His eyes never left Rip, and he added as they stepped into the night: “Maybe you can be something better.”

Rip tilted his head to one side. “I can only hope. And you?”

“Ah, you know me-” John rocked on his heels, “-heaven and hell won’t let me catch a break.”

“It seems we have miles to go, Mr. Constantine.”

“But . . .” And John couldn’t believe he was doing this again, but he gave Rip a sidelong look and shrugged. “Maybe our war can wait a night.”

Rip blushed under his collar, but there was a hopeful gleam to his eyes as he glanced over at John’s proposition. He looked years younger now than he had, then. Clean-shaven, calmer – _peaceful_. John was still trying, but seeing the change in Rip, he thought that it just might be possible; to change.

Rip’s eyes shone, for a moment, brighter than all of the stars overhead. “Perhaps there’s still hope for us both yet.”

The morning had come too soon. After that, they stayed in touch – not together, but something. Friends. Occasional lovers. Someone to call when the world felt like it would stop turning.

John ended up staying around the city for another year, on-and-off. He went on missions to hell and back, and so did Rip, but occasionally they met in the middle. It didn’t really have a name or boundaries, this thing between them – they just _were_. And if John slept better in Rip’s apartment, and learned what Rip truly smiling looked like – maybe it was worth stopping the world from going to hell in a hand basket, after all.

Then came the dangerous glint in Rip’s eyes that meant he had found a new problem to lose himself in. It was funny how afterwards, John never could say when it began. But somewhere along the way, thing changed between them again – Rip’s calls got less frequent, and whenever they did meet, he was . . . distracted. The nights in bars happened less and less. Old trauma never fully processed resurfaced, the closer it got to the date that had been circled on the calendar for years – the date that the legends and a horde of dinosaurs would crash time.

Rip started becoming more obsessed, and losing the light, and eventually – it was too much. He got hurt on missions and hid it from John, began hiding his research and staying for days on end at the Bureau during which time it was obvious he hadn’t slept; when he did get in, John was waiting, and Rip had a rumpled shirt and slightly manic eyes. He lied and said he was fine. He said _they_ were fine.

The opposite was true. After six months of Rip turning into a ghost in front of his eyes, trying to help, trying to hold _both_ of their souls together - John packed his sad little bag, and paused on the threshold to Rip’s apartment.

“If you ever need me – you’ve got my card. _Call_.”

“I will-” Rip murmured, barely glancing up from the stack of papers on his desk. “John, you don’t have to go-”

“Yeah,” John nodded. “Yeah, I do, mate.”

That had been it for six months, until a call came out of the blue – a tip about an exorcism and a girl in an asylum. And now they were sitting in a bar again; they somehow always ended up here.

John looked at Rip in Central City in 2017, and Rip avoided his gaze as John spoke. “You remember what it was like when we met?”

“Of course I do,” Rip scowled. “How could I forget?”

“ _I know_ you, Rip. All of this – the Time Bureau, Mallus, everything you’ve done since I’ve met you – it was to keep them safe; to save the world so they don’t have to. It’s not too late. If you care about your old team at all – tell them.” John learned back, shaking his head slightly, “We’re both too bloody old to keep fighting our demons alone.”

All of the energy drained from John as his glass emptied, and by the time his shoulders relaxed and he turned to look back at Rip, the other man had put his own tumbler down and was running a finger along the rim, face pensive. They sat in silence for a few minutes that way, neither saying anything; eyes flicking just as the other’s darted away.

Then, Rip said, “I’m sorry.”

It’s not something he says often enough to ignore, so John nods back. “I know.”

“I’m not very good at letting other people in.”

John snorted a laugh at the simplicity of that statement. It was naive, but sounded honest, so he nodded but restrained his mocking to a quiet, “You’re telling _me_.”

“But I think that you’re right, and I want you-” Rip cut himself off as John choked on his drink, blushing furiously under his collar and ignoring his Freudian-slip by rushing on, “-I want to place my _trust_ in you. I want to stop Mallus. I want to repair whatever relationship I have with the legends, because for a time, they were my friends. They got inside. And they don’t – they don’t leave, very easily.”

Rip smiled wryly. Sitting next to John at a bar, he looked over with a renewed hope in his gaze.

“I’m asking you to _stay_. Please.”

And John took a drink. Looking up, he grinned, bright and fierce, ready to take on Mallus and the world.

“You know you only ever had to ask. So, what’s the plan? Save the world?”

“Something like that,” Rip replied, relief evident in his face. “Same old life.”

“Better with two.”

And Rip smiled at that – fleeting, a quick upturn of his lips that somehow always managed to appear wry and self-deprecating – but it was a start. It was something.

“But we can save the world tomorrow-” Rip shrugged, “I have an asset to collect from Japan. Tonight-” he looked at John from the corner of his eyes, “-can I buy you a drink?”

**Author's Note:**

> hear me out . . . john & rip have been lowkey together for a long time and they're cool with it. depression banging and drinking too much. but they also would 100% go to hell for each other. they're . . . a Concept.


End file.
